The Book, Cat, & Cat Book Lovers Almanac

of historical trivia regarding books, cats, and other animals. Actually this blog has evolved so that it is described better as a blog about cats in history and culture. And we take as a theme the advice of Aldous Huxley: If you want to be a writer, get some cats. Don't forget to see the archived articles linked at the bottom of the page.

December 12, 2015

December 12, 1977

Her title later in life was Baroness Spencer-Churchill (April 1, 1885 to December 12, 1977). She was Clementine Churchill, Winston's wife and her Oxford Dictionary of National Biography recounts some interesting details:

...Throughout their married life, even if separated for only a few days, Clementine and Winston wrote spontaneous and informal letters to one another, intimately affectionate in tone, using their pet names Pug and Kat and reinforced with appropriate animal drawings. Her loyalty converted their marriage into a shared political adventure. ......

Clementine... on 18 June 1918, apparently without consulting Winston, ... offered Marigold [her third and infant daughter,] to her childless close friend Jean, Lady Hamilton. Her motive may have been sheer kindness to a friend distressed at her childlessness, but there may also have been a financial component: Churchill's finances were at an unusually low ebb at the time, and Clementine worried greatly about them. The offer was not taken up, and after a throat infection Marigold died in 1921 of septicaemia, her agonized mother giving at her deathbed ‘a succession of wild shrieks, like an animal in mortal pain'....

And we are on to lighter things. Here is the last part of a letter her husband wrote to her. We see their habit of adding animal drawings.